It is time to call a halt to the State's incarceration binge, writes IAN O'DONNELL
ONE OF the major “legacy” issues for the Government in the criminal justice arena is what to do with a site that was purchased at enormous expense in north Co Dublin for the construction of a gigantic prison.
The original idea was to build an institution at Thornton Hall that would accommodate up to 2,200 prisoners in what the Irish Prison Service euphemistically described as “multiple occupancy arrangements”.
In other words, what was held out as the solution to prison overcrowding would have overcrowding as a design feature.
To date, almost €45 million has been spent purchasing and preparing the land, but not a brick has been laid.
Soon after taking office, Minister for Justice Alan Shatter established a review group to advise him on how to proceed with this development. The group is expected to report next month.
Essentially, what is at stake here is what to do with an overpriced field and an ill-conceived plan.There is no doubt the prison population has risen dramatically in recent years. Since 2004 the total number of prisoners, including those released early due to lack of space, has risen by more than 50 per cent. In a surprisingly short period of time, Ireland has ceased to be a low imprisonment country.
The rapid increase in incarceration is out of line with trends across Europe.
One possible response to rising prisoner numbers is the provision of additional accommodation. However, it is widely acknowledged this is seldom, if ever, a lasting solution. The Council of Europe recommends that countries take the following steps when overcrowding becomes a problem, and a decision on Thornton Hall cannot be isolated from these wider considerations:
1. Reserve prison as an option of last resort, only to be used in the most serious cases;
2. Review the distribution of capacity. Is overcrowding worse in particular institutions or at particular times?
3. Put in place an adequate range of community sanctions and measures;
4. Carry out detailed analyses of the factors contributing to the growth in imprisonment, including the inter-relationships between patterns in crime, public sentiment, political priorities and sentencing practice;
5. Set a cap on the permissible number of prisoners for each institution;
6. Expand the use of open prisons;
7. Minimise the use of pre-trial detention;
8. Improve clarity on sentencing rationales;
9. Involve the judiciary in deliberations about penal reductionism;
10. Ensure the resource implications of sentences are taken into account by judges;
11. Enhance the use of remission and parole.
Underpinning all of the foregoing are two key principles. These are parsimony (jailing should be used sparingly, and only when no other sanction is appropriate) and dignity (when designing new prisons, or reconsidering the operation of existing ones, we should be confident that, wer members of our own families to be incarcerated, they would not experience degradation on top of loss of liberty). These principles are closely related, and when we lose sight of one, the other also tends to recede into the distance.
Expressions of concern over Irish prison conditions have been made over the past 25 years by the Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, the Inspector of Prisons, the prison chaplains, the Irish Penal Reform Trust, former prison service staff, ex-prisoners, and numerous commissions of inquiry and review groups.
The response to these concerns, which have consistently recommended a reduced emphasis on imprisonment and a more thoughtful, respectful approach to prisoners, has been slow and piecemeal.
Had these recommendations been adopted, it is unlikely the prison population would have drifted to such an unprecedented level. It is also possible that the conditions of confinement would have improved long ago, with more prisoners having access to clean, safe environments characterised by purposeful activity than is currently the case.
To give just one example of the speed with which the system moves when urgent questions are raised about prisoner dignity and safety, it is worth recalling the case of Gary Douch, a young man who was beaten to death in a communal cell in Mountjoy prison in August 2006, and whose body was smeared with excrement and dumped under a mattress.
A formal inquiry into the events surrounding this horrific killing was initiated in May 2007 and, more than four years later, its report has yet to be published. Not to bring such a tragic set of circumstances to a timely conclusion sends out a powerful negative message about prison service priorities. This message is amplified by the disproportionate amount of attention given to prison-building.
There is one way to combine a reduction in prisoner numbers with an improvement in the quality of prison life. This is to ensure that for every three new prison spaces provided, four old ones are taken out of commission. This would result in fewer prisoners being held, in better conditions. The financial savings of such a strategy could be spent on diverting young people from crime and reducing recidivism.
Given the roots of our economic difficulties, there can be few people who seriously think the petty property offenders who clog up the courts have really caused the most harm to Irish society. These circumstances may make decisions that would be unpalatable in other circumstances – such as reducing the scale of imprisonment – viable today.
Ian ODonnell is professor of criminology at University College Dublin